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? ? ? ? 'But you who read Spencer and Darwin and have never seen the inside of a school, how did you learn to read and write?' I queried.

? ? ? ? 'In the English merchant service. Cabin-boy at twelve, ship's boy at fourteen, ordinary seaman at sixteen, able seaman at seventeen and cock of the fo'c's'le; infinite ambition and infinite loneliness, receiving neither help nor sympathy, I did it all for myself- navigation, mathematics, science, literature, and what not. And of what use has it been? Master and owner of a ship at the top of my life, as you say, when I am beginning to diminish and die. Paltry, isn't it? And when the sun was up I was scorched, and because I had no root I withered away.'

? ? ? ? 'But history tells of slaves who rose to the purple,' I chided.

? ? ? ? 'And history tells of opportunities that came to the slaves who rose to the purple,' he answered grimly. 'No man makes opportunity. All the great men ever did was to know it when it came to them. The Corsican knew. I have dreamed as greatly as the Corsican.


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